


The Adventure Of The Salt King (1902)

by Cerdic519



Series: Elementary 221B [203]
Category: Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms, Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe - Detectives, Alternate Universe - Edwardian, Derbyshire, Destiel - Freeform, F/M, Gay Sex, Hand Jobs, Inheritance, Johnlock - Freeform, M/M, Untold Cases of Sherlock Holmes
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-08-13
Updated: 2017-08-13
Packaged: 2018-12-14 20:34:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,662
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11790951
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cerdic519/pseuds/Cerdic519
Summary: In one of those strange coincidences, Sherlock and John immediately encounter another case where a dying man has done something devious with his will. And where there's a will, there's a relative – in this case, four very unpleasant relatives, all of whom demand what is due to them. So Sherlock makes sure that they get it!





	The Adventure Of The Salt King (1902)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [princessgolux](https://archiveofourown.org/users/princessgolux/gifts).



> Mentioned elsewhere as 'the death of Crosby, the banker'.

The events of this story took place in the long, hot August of that year, shortly after the delayed Coronation of King-Emperor Edward the Seventh. They arose out of a run of deaths – none of which were suspicious, I should add – which led to this most curious and ultimately rather comical case.

I may have very occasionally glanced at the society pages in the _“Times”_ once in a while (and some blue-eyed genius could stop with the smirking right this minute, damn him!), as I found some of the characters therein 'colourful' to say the least. One such was Owen, fifth Earl of Radnorshire, a prodigious Marcher lord who although not yet forty had fathered some fourteen children! One of these, Penelope, had married a Mr. Walter Crosby, who took up a post in a private bank owned by his new father-in-law in the port of Liverpool. And it was there that he met an untimely end, courtesy of the recently-opened electric railway in a train crash that had occurred late the previous year.

If Earl Owen had the pedigree, then he was at least matched in his financial strength by his son-in-law's family. Mr. Walter Crosby's grandfather was Mr. Job Hallam, better known as the Salt King of Derbyshire because of all the mines that he owned. Mr. Hallam had had but one daughter, Mary, who had married twice, first to Mr. Crosby's father Patrick, who had died in an influenza outbreak back in 'Seventy-One, and then some years later to a Mr. Agamemnon Jones, who had died the previous year, curiously the day after Mr. Crosby. Mr. Patrick had been singularly unfortunate; whilst travelling in France he had been mistaken by someone who had thought he was the person cuckolding him, and the man had shot him on a French railway station. But then that is the French for you, I suppose.

Mr. Hallam himself had died barely two months after his son-in-law and grandson – pneumonia; he had suffered it every winter for the past few years – and in the normal run of events his great wealth would have been split amongst his four remaining grandchildren (i.e. Mr. Crosby's step-brothers and step-sisters), with provision being made for Mr. Crosby's widow. However, a clause in the will prevented the estate being settled for nine months after Mr. Crosby's death, presumably in case Mrs. Penelope Crosby had been with child. When no such event happened, a second part of Mr. Hallam's will was read – which was where the _real_ trouble began.

+~+~+

The man who called us in on the case was one Mr. Orlando Short, an unfortunate surname as he was some six foot six inches tall, although very wiry (Sherlock would not allow me to use the word 'bean-pole' – oops!). He was the manager in charge of the late Mr. Hallam's salt-mines, and had had to come down to London to sign some paperwork concerning the company that was running the mines after his late employer's passing whilst they waited to see if Mrs. Crosby was pregnant. As he was also a keen reader of my works – clearly a man of excellent taste, and someone could shut up right this minute! – he had decided to take the opportunity to call in on us.

“Mr. Agamemnon, sir, he had been in charge of things under Mr. Hallam”, the man said, folding his long spindly limbs into the famous fireside chair. “No great shakes, but he was all right, I suppose. His offspring – ugh!”

Sherlock looked amused by the man's frankness.

“Can you be a little more specific that 'ugh'?” he asked.

“Orestes, Chrysothemis, Electra and Iphigenia”, the man said dismissively. “I looked it up – I was curious; who would not be? – and they were the original Agamemnon chappie's children back in Greek times. But those four – sir, I am full afraid that they will ruin the estate between them, and that the miners themselves will pay the price. I doubt they could agree on what to have for breakfast, let alone run a business!”

“Let us begin at the beginning”, Sherlock said reasonably. “First, what is this estate all told?”

“I do not of course know anything about the rest of it value-wise”, our visitor said. “I am only concerned with the salt-mines, which are very profitable, and yield a steady income to the estate, probably more than comes in from the land these days. There is the big house, of course – Knaveby Hall, in poor shape now – and they used to own the land for miles around, though that has all been sold off now. They still own several properties in the village, I think.”

“Interesting”, Sherlock said. “If we put aside the investments in the mines to keep them up-to-date and profitable, then the late Mr. Hallam must have invested his receipts from those land sales somewhere. Art, perhaps, or jewellery?”

“He has a lot of paintings up at the Hall”, Mr. Short said. “None of his four grandsons and grand-daughters are married – Mr. Orestes, the eldest, is about thirty, I think – and Mr. Hallam enjoyed me taking my own children with me to see him, though of course the Greek Chorus hated it.”

“He sounds like he was a most agreeable employer”, Sherlock smiled. “I am afraid that I shall have to ask you a somewhat blunt question, sir. Did you yourself receive anything in the way of an inheritance from Mr. Hallam?”

The man smiled.

“Sort of, sir”, he said. “He gave out shares in the mines to all the men who had worked there for longer than a year, in proportion to their service. And he gave me something else, or at least my youngest, Peter; a wooden trinket-box that he liked to play with when he went to the house. To hear Mr. Orestes go on about it, you would have thought his father had handed over the Crown Jewels!”

“I should like to see that”, Sherlock said.

The man put his hand into his jacket pocket and pulled out an object wrapped in a handkerchief. Opening it, he revealed a carved box about three inches square and an inch in height. There was a single and rather dull dirty brown gemstone in the centre of the lid. It was, I thought, spectacularly uninteresting.

“I had to promise Peter that I would take good care of this”, he said. “I did wonder if it was worth anything.”

Sherlock took the box and carried it over to the window to examine it.

“Well, I would have liked to say that you are the proud possessor of a relic from the Byzantine Empire”, he said, “and that this eight or early ninth century creation is worth approximately one hundred thousand pounds.”

His blue eyes twinkled at our visitor, and I knew what was coming next.

“But it's a fake”, the mine-owner sighed.

“I would like to keep it for a few days, if I may”, Sherlock said, to the man's evident surprise. “Mr. Hallam must have gone to a good deal of trouble to obtain something resembling an item of great value. That in itself would have been costly, and I would like to know why he did it. Plus there are only four craftsmen – I correct myself; three craftsmen and one craftswoman – in London capable of such precise work. I wonder that your Greek Chorus allowed it out of the house.”

“They would not, until Mr. Orestes had called in an independent jeweller to examine it”, our visitor said. “You are right; he said it was at most a few pounds. Poor Mr. Hallam only saw Peter a couple of times after he gave it to him; he went downhill rapidly at the end.”

“Does this Mr. Orestes live at the Hall now?” I asked.

“They have all moved in whilst the estate is being sorted, sir”, Mr, Short said. “They had to wait until we all knew that Mrs. Penelope was not having any children post... post....”

“Posthumously”, I said. He looked relieved.

“That's the word”, he said. “And the lawyer – horrible little fellow called Mr. Medstead; I would not trust him an inch – he said that it will take a month before he can make a full evaluation of the whole estate. I bet he will be charging his fees the whole of that time. The mines and property were all being run by some private company whilst we waited to see if there was a new generation, though that will end once the final will is read. But I can guarantee one thing; they will have to sell the Hall.”

“Why?” Sherlock asked. The man chuckled.

“That lot agreeing to just one of them getting that place?” he scoffed. “More chance of Hell freezing over! Do you think that you can help, sir?”

I have to admit that I was surprised that Sherlock did not immediately say yes. This seemed exactly the sort of case he would enjoy.

“I think that we shall take your case”, he said eventually. “Unfortunately I have a small governmental matter to hand, courtesy of my annoying brother Bacchus. He may well die from shock if I dare to absent myself from the capital before it is concluded, and whilst I am indeed tempted to test that theory, my dear mother would not be best pleased if it turned out to be correct." He hesitated before adding, "well, probably not.”

I smiled at that.

“I promise you that we shall visit you in Derbyshire in between one week and ten days' time”, Sherlock said. “If you write your address on the notepad on the table there, we shall telegraph you a precise date once we have one. And the doctor will write your son a personal note from us both, promising to bring the box when we come, so he will have a formal receipt.”

The man did so, thanked us once more and left with his note.

“I did not know that we had a governmental case”, I said warily. “Please tell me that your irritating brother is not coming round any time soon.”

“After the way he had treated you of late”, Sherlock said coldly, “it was made patently clear to him that only a major emergency would warrant his presence in this household. And that if he came here without one, then he would leave head-first. Via the window!”

I felt strangely warmed at that.

“I have an idea about this case already”, Sherlock said, “but I need to make certain inquiries first, starting today. They and certain other possible preparations that I will need to do may take some time, which was why I requested a week. You are writing today?”

I sighed.

“I must”, I said. “The public are ever demanding to know of your doings.”

He was suddenly right next to me. I was hard so fast, my eyes watered.

“When I get home tonight”, he growled, “you will find that I too am quite demanding too. Especially” - he had somehow got his hand inside my trousers, and I groaned - “about _your_ doings!”

And before I could complain about his terrible sense of humour, the bastard proceeded to jerk me off right there and then, before going over to wash his hands at the small basin and sauntering from the room, a satisfied smirk on his face. Damnation! Now I would spend all day thinking about organizing a welcome home for him!

I smiled, and went to get myself cleaned up.

+~+~+

It was the following morning, and what was left of me slowly came to. I ached in every single part of my anatomy, but it was a glorious, satisfied ache. The bed was still warm and Sherlock had obviously wiped me down after my early-morning orgasm alarm call which had briefly disturbed my slumbers, before my poor, broken body had returned to the Land of Nod once more. 

As I have said on previous occasions, Sherlock was, for all his great mind, seemingly nervous that I might somehow lose interest in him if he did not keep coming up with new ideas for our couplings. And last night he has come up with a new idea based off my interest (lust) in him in a kilt. I had been the snarky subaltern, whose job was to warm the bed of the lusty Scots colonel who wanted to work off his army frustrations the (very) hard way. Still, I was sure that I would be able to walk again some time today. Probably. Or I might have to crawl to my writing-desk.

Dimly I could hear Sherlock through the slightly open door; he was talking to someone. There was the delicious smell of breakfast, and I hoped and prayed that he would have the decency to bring me some. And feed me. Look, I had earnt it!

“Where is Mr. Holmes?” I heard Mrs. Lindberg say. 

I smiled, wondering how Sherlock would explain my absence.

“I broke him!”

I heard her tinkling laugh, and stared at the ceiling in shock. But then, I supposed, he was right. And I could only hope that he tried to do it again, soon. There were a whole lot of 'employment possibilities' to work through. I wondered if the local library had a book with a list of them. Or I might order one from the bookshop....

+~+~+

A week later I was mobile again (and Mrs. Lindberg had just about stopped smirking, damn her!), so we set off for Derbyshire. We took a Midland Railway train from St. Pancras Station, which fortuitously stopped at Knaveby Hall Halt on request. I presumed (correctly, I found out later) that the owner at the time the railway had been built had been granted that right in return for allowing it to cross his land, as was common in those days.

Knaveby Hall itself was something of a disappointment, a plain grey stone building that loomed over the village of the same name, and looked very run-down. Mr. Short had suggested that, we would find it most comfortable to lodge at the Bear And Ragged Staff Inn in the small village; I thought it a little curious that a name normally associated with the Earl of Warwick was this far north, but then I remembered that Derbyshire and Warwickshire did meet with Staffordshire and Leicestershire at the famous Four Shire Stone in the south of this county, so perhaps it was not that surprising.

Sherlock had arranged for us to visit Mr. Short in his house on the day of our arrival, although we had time to unpack first. I liked our twin room with its low-hanging beams, though I suspected (and hoped) that one of the beds would get little use. 

Damnation, he was looking at me again!

Mr. Short lived in a small cottage of which my first impression was that I would have expected something rather grander for a mines manager. He explained, however, that it came with the job as it was near two of the four mines that he covered. His wife, a charming lady called Evelyn, rose rapidly in my estimation when she did not immediately simper at my friend, then sank even more rapidly when she did so – twice! - whilst her husband was making us drinks. They had three children with the eldest having moved out, leaving the aforementioned son Peter who was twelve years of age, and a daughter Beatrice who was nine.

Peter was delighted with the return of his box (which I thought looked even uglier in the dim light of the cottage), and we also presented his father with a signed copy of our latest collected works. 

“Did you find anything from the box?” Mr. Short asked after his son had taken his treasure away.

“Mrs. Colt of Aldwych made the copy for your late master”, Sherlock said. “From other inquiries, I understand that Mr. Hallam bid on the original when it came up for sale some time back. Presumably he wished for a copy for some reason; Mrs. Colt does not usually create her masterpieces from catalogue pictures. Have there been any developments in the case in the past week, sir?”

“Only one”, the manager said. “I do not usually believe in miracles, but the four up at the big house actually managed to agree on something, and decided to let go the whole staff. I suppose most of them must have been expecting it, what with the place looking likely to be sold, but I bet that the Greek Chorus regret it now.”

“Why?” I asked.

“Mr. Medstead told them afterwards that there were bits of the will that only came into effect if they did certain things, sir”, Mr. Short said. “I do not rightly understand it myself, but Mr. Hallam managed to arrange it that if any staff was let go within a year of his passing, then they qualified for shares in the mine like me and the long-servers did, on the same conditions and to come out of the Greek Chorus' inheritances. And he said something about a 'challenge clause'. Though I have no idea what that was about.”

“It is a clause inserted into a will to deter those who would contest it”, Sherlock explained. “People who wish to challenge the will must deposit a substantial amount of money as security, which if they are unsuccessful they then forfeit along with any inheritance they might otherwise had received. A clever move on his part; Mr. Hallam clearly foresaw what his grandchildren might try.”

It had probably not taken that much foresight, I thought, given what we knew about their characters.

“And the Chorus is up in arms about something else, sirs”, Mr. Short said. “Mr. Medstead said that the full will had to be read out in public, in the Red Lion next week.”

“I do have a question”, Sherlock said. “After these four – your Chorus – who is next in line to inherit the estate?”

Mr. Short looked surprised at that, as was I, but answered readily enough.

“That would be Mr. Israel Benington, sir”, he said. “Mr. Hallam, he had one much younger sister, a Miss Deborah. She married late in life, to a Mr. Jude Benington, a Jewish gentleman from down Derby way, but a very pleasant fellow. She had four sons, Mr. Israel being the eldest; sadly she died giving birth to the last, about fifteen years back.”

“How old is this Mr. Israel Benington?” Sherlock asked.

“Twenty-four, sir. He married two years ago, and his wife has a child on the way. He told me that he plans to name it after his uncle, if it is a boy.”

Sherlock was doing it again, looking hard at our host. He blushed fiercely.

“My eldest, Tom, he, uh, lives with Mr. Israel's younger brother Mr. Benjamin down in Matlock, They, uh.... they are... you know.”

“They are prone to waving their arms about for no apparent reason?” Sherlock asked, seemingly nonplussed. I swatted at him, and turned away to avoid the inevitable hurt expression.

“Stop being mean, Mr. Detective!” I said reprovingly. “Sherlock knows full well what you are saying, Mr. Short.”

The man looked intensely relieved.

+~+~+

A week later, it seemed that the whole village was trying to cram into the Red Lion to hear the reading of the will. Much to the annoyance of the Greek Chorus – who, I might add, really were as frightful in person as they had been made out to be – Mr. Medstead insisted on moving matters outside so that everyone could hear, as that had been his client's stated intention. Sherlock pointed out Mr. Israel Benington and his wife to me; I thought that they seemed a pleasant couple.

All went as expected until the last part of the will, after the bequest to Mrs. Crosby and all the various minor gifts had been dealt with. Mr. Medstead announced several bequests to charity, which I noticed that his grandchildren visibly disapproved of, and an amount to Mr. Israel Benington which earnt four even starchier (and creepily synchronized) looks, but finally he got to their inheritances.

“And finally”, Mr. Medstead read, “the residue of my estate is to be shared equally between my four grandchildren; Chrysothemis, Orestes, Electra and Iphigenia Jones.”

There was a definite snigger from somewhere in the audience. Mr. Orestes looked as if he wanted to kill the culprit. So did his sisters. 

“I am compelled”, Mr. Medstead said, “to inform all gathered here as to the precise amount involved. For each of the four recipients, it is seventeen shillings, sixpence and three farthings.”

I had heard the phrase 'you could cut the tension with a knife', but this time it was all too true. The silence was so shocked that I could hear a bird tweeting from a tree at the back of the pub. At least until Mr. Orestes found his voice.

“How on earth?” he yelled. “What the blazes are you taking about, Medstead?”

“The Hall is one hundred per cent mortgaged”, the lawyer said dryly, “as were the properties my late client owned in the village. The salt mines, as stated, are part of Mr. Benington's bequest. I am sorry to tell you, sir, that the cupboard is bare.”

He did not sound sorry one little bit, I thought. Nor would I have been.

“We shall see you in court!” Miss Chrysothemis screamed, before she flounced off in a sea of mauve crinoline. Her brother and sisters followed her, arguing all the way. Sherlock grinned.

“That went about as well as expected!” he grinned.

+~+~+

Before leaving for London, Sherlock insisted on saying our farewells to Mr. Short. The agony of the Greek Chorus had been compounded by the fact that the new owners of the Hall were insisting that they leave within the week, and with no funds for any legal effort on their behalf, it looked very much as if they would have to. I was sure that area would not exactly miss them.

“What do you think it was?” Mr. Short asked as we sat there in the summer sun. “Bad investments?”

Sherlock smiled.

“On the contrary”, he said. “I think that the late Mr. Hallam was _exceptionally_ skilled in his investment choices. I only hope that the ultimate beneficiary of his actions deserves all the efforts that he has made on their behalf.”

We both stared at him in confusion.

“What efforts?” I asked.

“I am afraid that I started this case by lying to you, Mr. Short”, Sherlock said apologetically. “When you laid the facts before me, the solution seemed simple enough, but to secure justice would clearly be somewhat problematical. I needed a week in London to put in place certain arrangements before coming here. After all, although I was called in by you, I was clearly serving the interests of the late Mr. Job Hallam, and that meant ensuring that his estate was inherited by someone who deserved it.”

“But there is no estate”, Mr. Short pointed out. “It has all gone. Though I would love to know what he spent all that money on.”

Sherlock grinned.

“Let us view things from the late Mr. Hallam's point of view”, he said. “He knows that, with the untimely death of his preferred grandson Mr. Walter Crosby, that the Greek Chorus will inherit, squabble over and quite probably ruin his estate. There is however an alternative. His great-nephew who, by fortuitous circumstance, has a brother who is living with the son of his loyal mines manager. And at the time Mr. Hallam made his will, he knew that Mr. Israel was married, although the next generation had not quite yet materialized.”

“The most profitable part of the estate, namely the mines, are transferred to a private company which in turn passes them onto Mr. Benington some time later. This is a clever legal device, because the delay in waiting to see if Mrs. Crosby is pregnant means that it cannot be challenged. However, that still leaves a very large sum of money to hand.”

“The visit of your young son and his playing with items of jewellery gives him an idea. Working with Mr. Medstead – a man, by the way, who fully deserves his fees for all that he has done – Mr. Hallam first mortgages the estate to the hilt and gathers as much available cash as he can. He then invests it all into something small and unobtrusive.”

“Jewellery?” I asked. Sherlock smiled.

“A trinket-box”, he said softly. Mr. Short went pale. 

“You mean that my son.... that box.....”

Sherlock smiled, and reached into his pocket. He pulled out something wrapped in tissue-paper, and opened it to reveal a trinket-box identical to the one that young Peter Short was playing with across the room.

“I told you that Mr. Hallam bid on the original box”, he said. “I may have neglected to mention that he was _successful_. Mrs. Colt did not think it unusual to be asked to produce a perfect copy of such a masterpiece; many owners have fake copies of expensive items which they display in case of theft, and she remembered the commission because of the urgency requested by the client.”

“Mr. Hallam allows his unpleasant descendants to have the fake box valued, after which he knows they will - reluctantly - allow it out of the house. He then gives your son - not the fake, but the real box, and all that wealth is carried out of the reach of his grasping grand-children. Excluding auction fees, the price paid was, as I said earlier, a little under one hundred thousand pounds

“My son.... but why?”

“Because Mr. Hallam trusted you to do the right thing”, Sherlock said, looking pointedly at the manager. “He knew that _you_ would make sure that it was passed to Mr. Israel Benington, especially given that your son is living with that gentleman's brother. He knew of your interest in my stories, and guessed that you might seek out my help; doubtless he recalled the many times that I have applied justice rather than the strict letter of the law. He doubtless also arranged your visit to London to sign some papers, guessing – correctly – that you would call in on me, Finally, Mr. Hallam was wily enough to know his village to the extent that, had his nephew ever visited him, then everyone – and his terrible grandchildren - would have known, and he did not dare risk communicating his intentions in case his letters were intercepted. But you, he knew he could trust.”

Mr. Short seemed to pull himself together.

“That he could”, he said. “And I shall prove worthy of that trust.”

+~+~+

He did. Mr. Israel Benington came into his inheritance at the same time as he acquired his first-born son, whom he did name after his late uncle. They did not live at Knaveby Hall, as the building's new owners had it condemned and pulled down, but they did move to a large house in the village. The Greek Chorus tried everything short of an open challenge to the will, but ended up only poorer than when the had started; I doubt that many tears were shed for them. The mines went from strength to strength, and Mr. Benington, in gratitude for our help, gave us each some shares in the workings, which added a nice little sum to my bank balance each quarter and, in Sherlock's case, made life at his orphanage even better for the boys therein.

And I had a nice week in Derbyshire, and some of the best walking country that England had to offer. Although thanks to some sex-mad detective, I was not really in a position to do a whole lot of walking.

If any!

+~+~+

Next time, Sherlock and I once more end a case on a Kentish railway station platform – and what follows leaves me in tears.

**Author's Note:**

> Author's Note: The inheritance per grandchild would equate to just under £90 ($115) at 2017 prices. The box in comparison would have been worth at least £10 million ($13 million), although again the prices of such items have far outstripped inflation, so probably a good deal more.


End file.
